


Fingers running red.

by PepperCat



Series: Velvet Detonation [7]
Category: The Flash (TV 2014)
Genre: Alcohol, Angst, Family Drama, Gen, Minor Injuries, Non-Consensual Drug Use, Rachel Rathaway's A+ Parenting, Swearing, vague allusion to conversion therapy, vague allusion to traumatic memories
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-20
Updated: 2020-07-20
Packaged: 2021-03-04 22:41:43
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,337
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25394044
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PepperCat/pseuds/PepperCat
Summary: Hartley's birthday is less than ideal; Axel is startled into trying to help.Rating, as usual, is for slightly grim content rather than for smut.
Relationships: Hartley Rathaway & Axel Walker
Series: Velvet Detonation [7]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/971580
Kudos: 17





	Fingers running red.

Boo is the kind of person Axel figures you can trust in the short term, and she doesn't seem _wrong_ about things, but habits are hard to break so he's in his room thinking stuff over and deciding what he's gonna do that night when he hears the heavy smash from the kitchen.

His first thought isn't to worry. Not more than you usually do if you hear that noise, at any rate, and after a second and no explosion or hiss or crackle, he figures it's not someone throwing in anything fancy and goes to check it out. Worst case some idiot pitched a rock through the window for shits'n'giggles, best case one of the rats knocked something off the counte--

Axel gets to the kitchen and there's _so much red_ everything goes bright.

Piper's on his knees and there's a spreading puddle of dark red in front of him and there's blood and glass in his fingers and glass in the red, and he looks up and starts to say something that's meant to be his version of _go away_ but his face is wet and something's shining in his hands as he reaches up for his eyes and there's red everywhere and it's _Piper_ , if he gets hurt when no-one else is in the house but Axel--

He's down on his knees and grabbing Piper's wrists before he can even really imagine the cold, and Pipes does this twisting yanking thing that is a hell of a lot squirmier than Axel would've thought and he's saying something sharp but that's not the point, the point is the red puddle they're kneeling in and the glitter of broken glass in his fingers.

" _Piper--_ " loud enough that it cuts right over whatever the guy is saying, and Piper jerks his head back-- " _no!_ "

Shit. He wasn't thinking about the noise. But Piper makes a little hiccupping sound and puts his head down, and instead of that weird twisting thing he just yanks his hands towards his ears (and Axel's holding on so he still can't make it) and then he goes still. Mostly still. He's shaking a little, but he's not _pulling_ anymore. And the red isn't all blood, isn't even _mostly_ blood--Piper's hands are bloody but not his wrists, and Axel can smell wine and some of the glass stuck in Piper's hands-- _stuck_ in them, he's not holding it--is green and not clear.

Axel gets a proper breath in. "You'll get glass in your eyes," he says. "Piper?"

"Breedmore," Piper says, and his voice sounds thin and dry like someone twisted his throat until it wasn't any bigger than a piece of string. " _Breedmore_ , that's _fucking_ f- _fantastic_ \--" He makes a noise like someone's reaching down his throat and squeezing his heart.

Axel can't remember if he's ever heard Piper _swear_ before, but the I'm-not-crying sound and that miserable shocked expression takes him back just like all the red did. He lets go of Piper's wrists and leans forward so he can get his arms around the guy's shoulders. "Hey." Quiet, like you would to see if someone's awake. "Hey, c'mon..."

Piper's shoulders knot up like someone's run a charge through him, and Axel thinks _and I thought you were uptight **before**_ and giggles. Piper makes that hiccuping noise again, a twisty little gasp. Axel can feel the breath wet against his throat.

"Hey," he says again, and then "Pipes, c'mon, you've gotta get up," or something like that. Not like it's urgent, 'cause if Piper can't clean up broken glass he's not gonna cope well with _urgent_ , either. Just... encouraging. "Pipes, come on..."

It's awkward as hell but they get up on their feet, staggering a little on the wet floor, and as soon as they're steady Piper pulls away. Backs away until he's up against the sink. There are half-footprints in wine on the kitchen floor, and little drops of blood beside them. Most of the bits of glass in Piper's hands are small but there are some long thin pieces studded into the meat, running red, looking like the guy just tried to sweep all the pieces together in his hands without thinking that they'd jam in.

Maybe he'd just have scratched up his face _around_ his eyes, slices like deep papercuts. Maybe. There was just so much _red_ Axel got all tangled up and couldn't think straight for a second.

"You okay?"

Piper's mouth opens but he doesn't do that low wail Axel remembers seeing from people this upset, not even the silent kind where you don't make noise so no-one'll pick on you. Instead he just swallows, hard enough Axel can imagine how it hurts the guy's throat, and turns around to face the sink. Axel hears the silvery noise of glass shards falling onto the metal.

"Look," he says to Piper's back, "I'm gonna go get bandages 'n whatever, okay? You just make sure you've got all the glass out."

Comes back with the first aid stuff from the bathroom and also a towel that he just drops over the whole mess of wine and glass because that can be a later problem. He puts the first aid stuff on the counter near the sink and leans one elbow next to it.

Piper's still not looking at him. His face is white and wet and his eyes are... they're watering, but Axel doesn't know if they're tears. They look like tears but Piper's not breathing like he's crying. It's the weirdest damn thing and so quiet, and Axel realizes that if he hadn't heard the glass breaking he'd have no idea anything was going on.

"Piper," he says. "What the hell?"

He has wanted to see what would happen if you broke through Piper's poise, yeah; has wanted to see the long fuse of temper finally spark and the spray of shrapnel that would follow. That would be fun.

This isn't fun.

"I wasn't thinking about how best to clean it up," Piper says. And that's practically normal, but then he adds "I _fucked up_ , I didn't _think_ ," and his voice is shaking again. "I'm so _fucking sorry_ for the inconvenience--"

Right.

"It's okay," Axel says. "It's okay, right?" He pulls a coffee mug off the shelf and sets it on the counter. Pulls another bottle of wine out of the cupboard where Piper keeps them. It's a-- twist-top, bottle-top, whatever you call it when wine doesn't need a corkscrew.

"You need a hand getting the bandages on?" Piper turns his back and hisses that he does _not_ , and while he's doing that, Axel crushes the little white pill that was the _whatever_ of _bandages 'n whatever_ between the bottom of the wine bottle and the counter as he's twisting the lid off, then sweeps the powder into the mug. Tops it off with wine and as Piper turns back around he steps up close, holding it out.

Piper shows his teeth instead of taking it. "I'm fine." Doesn't even say _thank you_ the way he does when he means _go to hell_ , and his face is still wet.

"You wanted some, right?" Axel hands the mug over, and-- well, it's Piper, he's not gonna let it fall. "You grab a drink, I'm gonna see about getting the glass."

"I'll--"

"Let me get it before your rats run across it or something, okay?" He lets go of the wine and Piper grabs it with his free hand to steady it, stands there against the sink with the mug held in both hands like a kid drinking hot chocolate. Axel flips the towel over, starts dropping the bigger chunks of glass into the middle of it. Between the wine and the little bits of glass sprinkling it like glitter, he'll just throw the whole thing out later.

He finishes it mostly up, wipes down the floor with damp paper towel to pick up the bits he missed, and just rolls the whole thing into a kind of sloppy knot. That'll do. Piper's stopped leaning against the counter and is sitting on the kitchen floor with his back to the sink, knees up and hands folded around the mug.

"How you doing, Pipes?"

Piper doesn't answer for a moment, and then he sets the mug down beside him. It's pretty much empty. "It's my birthday," he says quietly.

"Happy birthday?" Piper makes a soft noise in response, not a groan or a laugh exactly. "You get anything?"

"I got a card."

"Yeah?" Axel can't imagine that having much to do with this. "Did it come with the wine?"

Piper rubs his sleeve across his eyes. "It came with papers. I thought they wanted to see me because she actually sent a card." He sounds exhausted, like when he's finally finished working on something and he's still walking around even though his brain's packed up for the night, but he doesn't sound raw. "Papers all folded up. I read the card first and I wanted to..." He sighs and his head drops forward. Axel sits down next to him.

"I get it." He does. Not the details, okay, and he's kind of wondering if the papers were... like, _happy birthday, here's your dad's cancer diagnosis_ or something... but he knows that Piper's family is a weird unhappy thing. And birthdays can be a flashpoint for freaking out over what you wish family _would_ be, he's seen it happen. He's been pretty steady himself, mostly, but he knows other kids didn't have as cool a dad as he did.

Piper clears his throat. "I was h-h--" Axel isn't sure if the guy is going to say _hoping_ or _happy_ or what, but Piper just drops the word and goes quiet. "Axel," he says after a minute.

"Uh-huh?"

"What'd you put in the wine?"

Axel chuckles a little and bumps his shoulder into Piper's. "You're sharp." _So sharp you'll cut yourself_ , and the thought makes him giggle. "Just taking the edge off, you looked like you needed it."

"You shouldn't've..." Piper frowns and starts over, words coming out all crisp. "Should not have done that."

"You can be mad about it later," Axel says cheerfully enough. He looks over at where the wine spilled. The grout between the tiles is still red; probably need bleach to get that out, and he's not sure he'd bother. "But you're feeling better, right?"

"Not the point."

"Sure." Axel's grinning 'cause he knows that means he's right. Whatever. Piper's still looking unhappy, but he's looking _unhappy_. He's not looking barely-noticed-I-shoved-my-hands-full-of-glass-while-I-was-crying-and-shaking. "It's not gonna hurt, Pipes. Just mellow you out a bit." He laughs. "It's like a birthday present, okay?"

"I didn't ask for a present."

"Bet it's not the worst one you've gotten," Axel says, and Piper's face twists again. He leans his head back against the cupboard and closes his eyes. Pushes his glasses up so he can rub at the corners of his eyes and he's still not breathing like he's crying, but there are wet marks on his nose when he takes his hand away, and Axel can see slick spots on the bandages.

"Sorry," Axel says after a moment.

Piper shrugs.

Axel thinks about the cancer idea again. "Your parents okay?"

"They're fine." Piper lets out a little huff of air. "They're _fantastic_ ," and for a second some of the anger is back, but it flickers out again. "They're healthy and thoughtful and... And so concerned that my mother reached out to help. On my _birthday_."

Help does not sound bad. Parents who _claim_ to be helping can really mess you up, though; Axel has seen it.

"They get you a lawyer or something?" Except that might actually be useful. As far as Axel knows, Piper hasn't done anything to get his name in papers-- like, people know the Pied Piper is one of Cold's Rogues, but _Hartley Rathaway_ is not a name that shows up in the important news. Maybe there's a warrant out for him that the TV and newsblogs don't really cover, but...

Piper puts his hand over his eyes. "They got me a booking for Breedmore." His mouth twitches like someone's caught a thread running under his skin and just pulled the whole thing out. "She said I could come home after."

The name still doesn't mean anything to Axel. "What's that?"

"It used to be..."

Piper trails off for long enough that Axel wonders if he's actually gone to sleep. He's just deciding whether he should bring in a couch cushion or an actual pillow when Piper speaks again. "It's a private care facility now. You'd _think_ they'd change the name."

Axel figures he can Google later if he cares. Mostly right now what he's thinking is that Piper seems to have calmed the hell down and at least tomorrow won't be his birthday so this'll probably be less of a mess. "Hey, Pipes, you're probably gonna crash soon. You might as well do it in your room, okay?"

"Sensible," Piper says, but it still takes him a second to start to get to his feet, and he holds onto the counter until he's all the way up. Axel backs away to give him space, straightens up and watches, but the guy seems steady. Just slow.

"I'd appreciate it if you didn't mention this to anyone."

Axel shrugs and picks up the towel, looks at the kitchen floor. The puddle is gone, but he can see the ghost of it in the grout that's stained red between the tiles. The wet weight of the towel in his hands makes him shiver, just once, like he's shaking off a ghost.

"Yeah, whatever," he says, grinning. "You broke a wine bottle, Pipes, it's no big deal."

He takes the towel out to the garbage. By the time he comes back inside, the door to Piper's room is closed and he can hear something playing softly inside. He doesn't recognize it, except to know that it's not "Happy Birthday."

**Author's Note:**

> "Breedmore" is a reference to Breedmore Mental Hospital, where Hartley-from-the-comics was sent (can I say incarcerated?) after a breakdown.
> 
> It's been a long while. I'm glad to have something up. Please pardon the rust.


End file.
